


Purple Skies

by dexterous



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Attempted Sexual Assault, Head Injury, Hurt Neil Josten, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, M/M, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-22
Updated: 2019-08-17
Packaged: 2020-07-11 12:20:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19927981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dexterous/pseuds/dexterous
Summary: Neil feels like a puppet whose strings have been flung through the window of a moving car and ruthlessly snapped. He’s been left for dead on a concrete highway. Maybe it’s because he hasn’t had a good run in awhile, the ache in his ribcage is an old bruise of past violence.Or maybe it was the asshole at Eden’s who slipped something extra in his uncovered drink.





	1. Sticky Floors

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: There is an attempt of rape in this piece but it doesn’t go all the way. There is non-consensual drugging and mentions of graphic injuries. The sexual assault scene is graphic.

“You’re a fucking dumbass,” Andrew deadpans.

Neil hums, blearily taking note of the way Andrew’s left fist clenches around the steering wheel, but more attentive to the slight shift in his hazel eyes as he glances furiously at Neil’s overstretched, limp form.

Neil feels like a puppet whose strings have been flung through the window of a moving car and ruthlessly snapped. He’s been left for dead on a concrete highway. Maybe it’s because he hasn’t had a good run in awhile, the ache in his ribcage is an old bruise of promised violence.

Or maybe it was the asshole at Eden’s who slipped something extra in his uncovered drink.

His memory filters through like a broken kaleidoscope as Neil belatedly takes note of the passing landscape. He's in a car. He was just at Eden's a few moments ago, or was it hours? Days? He doesn't know.

Neil forces his foggy mind back, remembering pounding music before the earth was pulled underneath him, eyes unfocused and body sluggish.

He told Andrew he was going to the bathroom. In a passing glance, Aaron said he didn’t look very good. And Nicky had laughed and joked about “one too many nonalcoholic sodas”.

Then he was in the bathroom, hunched over the toilet of an open stall – the one furthest from the door – with nothing coming out. The floor was distinctly sticky and he felt grit in his nails before he noticed a presence behind him. If his mom was here, she’d scold him for getting soft, being unaware. But she wasn’t.

So Neil let her phantom fear wash over his mind like ice water just as someone flipped him over.

His back hit the ground and his head collided with the edge of the toilet bowl. If Neil weren’t so concerned about the world running laps behind his eyes, he would be grossed out. But all he could feel was sympathy towards steel horses nailed in carousels.

He had slurred out, “Andrew, no.” Which meant, _not yes._

It had to be the small blonde who followed him back, fitted his hips against Neil’s, because no one else touched him like this. 

But Andrew didn’t halt in his movements, instead fumbling harder with Neil’s zipper, pulling the back of his jeans lower, adjusting long legs to either side of the man’s torso, rubbing a rough palm over Neil’s front.

It was then that Neil’s eyes snapped open, despite the dizzy static that threatened to throw him overboard and drag him to sea.

_Andrew would have stopped._

At Neil’s fleeting sudden awareness, an unfamiliar hand gripped both of Neil’s wrists and lifted them above his head, pressing to the sticky floor.

At that moment, despite the tacky wetness running down Neil’s neck and the unpleasant bass of an unknown song thudding in tune with his pounding heart, Neil was brought back to cold eyes and black walls and leather seats and sizzling flesh.

And then a slimy tongue lodged its way down Neil’s throat.

He had the sense of mind to gag and wrench away in confused disgust.

The man above him didn’t seem to notice, trading Neil’s mouth for other sensations; he reached underneath Neil’s backside and groped trembling, pliant skin with sure, rough hands.

Something hard and unforgiving wedged itself between his cheeks and Neil lurched to the side, as far as his restrained wrists allowed him. His pained, choking gasp almost overshadowed the stranger’s deep moan as the man rutted his clothed front in tune with an intruding digit.

Neil skin crawled with a thousand legs of a thousand centipedes. He thought of rats and knifes and sticky floors, and _fucking fight back,_ but his body refused to act for his mind’s wishes.

He belatedly realized he should be struggling harder, use his nails, his hips, his thighs, but Neil was submerged in water – or maybe it was a dream. Maybe he should focus on waking up soon instead.

The movements grew rougher, rocking Neil like a car with three wheels or a boat on uneven waves. And Neil thought he said something, _stop_ or _please,_ but he can’t remember if the words managed to leave his imagination.

Instead, he heard Andrew’s voice, _I hate that word. I hate you._

And then his mom’s, _Get the fuck up and fight, Abram. Kill him. Nathanial, do you hear me?_

Time slipped between his fingers like grains of salt from the beach where he buried her.

Realistically, it only could have been a few moments of sharp movements, shallow moans, before the stranger was ripped away from him, the door slamming open and then closed. Hurried footsteps, more than two. Cold air replaced the heat that occupied Neil's space.

There were distinct sounds of hands on flesh, thuds on walls, echoing screams.

He thought he may have fallen asleep – or maybe he was never awake, never real at all. Maybe he died next to his mom that night, peeled his skin from the seat, or he was still with Riko or Lola or –

Neil’s eyes were pried open by blonde hair and hazel eyes.

“An-ndrew,” he slurred. Black spots invaded his vision.

“Wrong twin,” Andrew-look-alike said back.

 _Aaron,_ his muddled mind supplied. He thought he said that out loud but he also thought the sky would look prettier if it was purple so maybe not. 

“Hey, _hey,_ stay awake. Are you hurt anywhere else besides your head?” Neil realized his eyes must have slipped closed against his will again.

His head? Neil took note of the warm liquid running down his neck. Sweat? Blood? Does it matter?

He tried to concentrate on the distorted twin in front of him but his eyes were cameras now, focusing in and out, in and out. He wished he had the manual to work this thing.

 _Focus,_ the logical part of his brain – the part that kept him alive all these years – urged.

Right. _Right._ He has to tell Aaron not to drink the soda and not to touch the floor - it’s sticky.

Neil reached his hand up, lightly grappling for Aaron’s face but landing on the side of his neck.

“Don’t drink the floor,” he managed to get out. Aaron stared. Neil stared back. His trembling hand rubbed wearily on Aaron’s neck and flexed desperately.

“You,” Neil took a shaky breath, “You kind of look… look like Andrew. Where – where is…” Neil trailed off as he heard a loud bang and louder cries to his right.

The struggling sounds overlapped with Neil's own thumping heart. Or maybe it was the music. It must have been several minutes since those odd noises began. Or several hours or several years.

Neil's head rolled to the side to gaze under the stall. Found the source. There was a slumped body, red, two blurry figures standing, sharp movements, _red_ –

Neil's thoughts battled each other for clarity but each time one came to the forefront of his mind, it slipped away like a misplaced breeze. Maybe it was never there.

Aaron clenched Neil’s wrist, bringing his attention back to the blonde. Neil's hand had gone limp, only held up by thin fingers. A loaded truck dangling from a spiderweb.

Aaron leaned away to address two blobby figures behind him – his loose, shaky grip still pressed lightly to Neil’s clammy skin.

Neil was sure if Aaron let go, he'd float right to the top of the stained ceiling. Then spin, spin, spin like a broken fan or a steel horse. 

A hand tapped his cheek but Neil's cameras stopped working, his eyes had closed on their own accord. His head was filled with bees.

“… concussion… likely drugged… can’t focus on…” Words filtered through the air around him. They traced scars on his cheek.

“No hospitals.” A new voice. Hard, unrelenting, familiar. A tight grip on his ankle. 

“... the guy?” Aaron again.

The swarm was restless. Bees - no, wasps now. Their wings snapped together, an all-consuming buzzing. Or maybe it was screaming.

”Dealt with.” The grip tightened. His wrist, his ankle, both.

A third voice now, shaky, tugging, “Andrew, listen… pants… he needs… home... medical supplies...”

Neil floated along a river like a decayed log from a branch that was severed years ago.

He was brought back to sudden wakefulness when someone tugged at his arms and shoulders, making his body sit up and fall forward onto a hard chest. His lower back ached unfamiliarly.

If it didn’t feel like his mind was walking through green jelly, he would have flinched back and opened his eyes. But now? His unresponsive form slumped forward unwillingly. Someone gently fixed his pants, wiped the curls out of his clammy forehead, adjusted his limbs so he was resting comfortably on another’s back. Neil’s arms hung loosely and his cheek rested softly on a clothed shoulder.

_The sky would be so much prettier if it was purple._

* * *

Neil wakes in the passenger seat of a moving car. His head is slumped over his chest, his body angled toward the barely restrained anger of Andrew in the driver’s seat. Neil blearily takes note of the way Andrew’s left fist clenches around the steering wheel, but he’s more attentive to the slight shift in his hazel eyes as Andrew glances at Neil’s overstretched, limp body.

Neil sees Andrew’s lips move but the cotton in his ears blocks everything besides the rushing sound of his own blood.

“Huh?” Neil slurs out.

“I said,” Neil doesn’t know how Andrew can even speak through the tension in his clenched jaw, ”You’re. A. _Fucking. Dumbass_.”

“Andrew.” A voice warns from behind.

Neil lolls his head to the side and back, sees Aaron glaring daggers at Andrew’s matched stare in the rearview mirror. Nicky is trembling next to him.

When Neil makes eye contact with the taller boy, he notices one eye is swollen shut, with black and blue blending into the corners of his nose like the same watercolor paintings that decorate Betsy's office. Neil hates watercolors.

Nicky gives him a tentative smile. Neil thinks it’s supposed to be reassuring but it looks more like a grimace.

Neil doesn’t care. Three plus one equals five. Always five. Something – no, someone – is missing.

“Kevin?” Neil questions, his eyebrows furrowing. Something prods the corner of his mind. He can't remember.

“He’s,” Nicky swallows, “He’s back at the Tower, remember? He wanted to stay in and we, um, went to Eden’s. We’re going back to the house now. You know, in, uh, in Colombia.”

In the midst of Nicky’s nervous ranting and side glances, Neil had closed his eyes again and rested his cheek on the center console, facing the road. He’s tired. No, he’s in pain. He’s a steel horse on a carousel.

Silence envelopes the car for a few moments but the blissful unconsciousness that blessed Neil before had clearly taken a one-way train ride miles away from this disaster. So he continues to lay unmoving.

Maybe it was because Neil’s head and back are playing a game of who-can-inflict-more-pain. Maybe it was the soft confusion setting up camp in the black spaces of his mind. Maybe it was the drugs tying ankle weights to every open catalogue of his skin. 

“Neil?” The same small voice questions from the back, “Are you, uh, o-okay?”

 _I'm fine,_ Neil thinks he says, but the resounding quiet informs him that he’s still lying prone, imitating a dead body. Like Riko. Like his father. Like his mom.

He tries to pry his eyes open and reassure Nicky but the weight drags him under, making Neil unable to move, much less speak. It ends up not mattering when Andrew inevitably snaps.

“Actually, Nicky,” he drawls. Andrew sounds like oil and fire. Like a cobra in a garden Nicky is walking towards. 

“You shouldn’t be asking that question. Because, as you know, he was drugged. And then smacked around like some fucking bitch right before he was _assaulted_. While _you_ decided it would be a good idea to flirt with a homophobic asshole.” 

The dangerous tone lingers like stale meat.

If Neil weren’t a thousand miles away from his body, floating – no spinning – above the car, he would have connected the dots. Why they didn't follow Neil in the bathroom. Why it took so long to check up on him. Why Nicky’s eye is swollen and black. 

_Did Andrew give that to him or was it some other guy in the bar?_ Is what Neil would have thought if his mind wasn't currently scattered in tiny fragments across the Pacific Ocean.

But instead, he listens tiredly and tries to fit events in empty pockets like loose change that doesn’t add up.

Neil still doesn’t completely know what happened, especially after they had found him. Frustration and confusion fight for missing pieces. He forces himself to sit up slightly and turn to look more fully at Andrew. It drains every ounce of strength from his form. There's dried blood on Andrew’s knuckles. 

_What happened to the guy?_ Is what Neil wants to say.

Instead, the rising sun behind Andrew’s stiff silhouette catches Neil's attention. Waves in golden oranges and deep yellows. He’s never seen a sunrise before. Or, he has when he was on the run, but he never had the chance to really notice its rise without fear clogging his throat and an unyielding grip on his arm.

There’s soft lavender, he realizes. Neil feels the stretch of a smile before his head lightly thumps back down on the console.

“The sky would be prettier if it was purple all the time,” is what Neil slurs out.

He thinks Andrew would agree. Or maybe not. Maybe he would think about planes and falling and bruises when they’re at their worst. Neil focuses back on Andrew.

He's staring at Neil, his expression seemingly blank to anyone who doesn’t know him well enough. But Neil does. Neil sees rawness and danger and anger and fear and anger. Neil would rather look at a boring, blue sky for the rest of his life than see Andrew’s face like this again. 

He swallows painfully, reaches a shaky, unsteady hand to Andrew’s shirt, right above his heart. It falls limp a moment after, unable to maintain any position that requires strength. 

“Hey,” Neil says. It takes him a few times to find his voice, “I’m… I’m fi- okay. My head feels foggy and my back... I think my tongue is… is bigger than it normally is but… the sky is… look at…” Neil trails off.

His head rests forward on his chest. It’s so heavy. How was he able to keep it up before? 

_But this is important_ , his mind rationalizes. Neil gets out one last sentence. 

“I can still yes or no and it’s still yes with you. Not him, or anyone else, but you.”

Nicky and Aaron are quiet but Andrew’s silence is loud.

Neil lifts his head again and tugs lightly on Andrew’s shirt. His eyes are unfocused and it’s getting more difficult to stay awake. His limbs feel like they’ve been taken off and reattached to another body. Frankenstein was the name of the scientist, not the monster.

He doesn’t know why but he has to stay awake, he has to let Andrew know he’s here. His body watches the scene from the clouds. 

“Andrew?” There’s purple behind him. It doesn’t matter.

Andrew looks over and meets his wavering, unsteady gaze. He’s struggling to focus on the color hazel – his frame is blurring in and out like when Neil opens his eyes under a chlorine pool.

“One hundred and one, Josten.” Something lightens in Andrew’s tone, in his eyes, “Go to sleep.”

A part of Neil lets out a slow breath he didn’t know he was holding. His eyes flutter shut one last time and he fully relaxes into the seat. Neil’s arm is still outstretched on the console, his cheek resting on his bicep. Neil doesn't have the strength to move but Andrew doesn’t seem to mind the light brush of knuckles on his shirt at every small bump on the highway.

The sky is likely turning blue now but Neil thinks it’s fine like that anyway. 

“Okay. I’m sorry. But - did you understand any of that?” Nicky’s voice pipes up in a hushed whisper from the back, “They have their own _language_.”

He sounds absolutely giddy.

“Allison is going to _completely_ lose it!”

Aaron snorts once before Andrew’s calm voice breaks through Nicky’s giggles in a sharp cut.

“One more word.” He threatens. It sounds like he's speaking through his teeth.

Neil’s no longer looking at anyone – he’s one step away from a cliff of darkness and purple and peace – but he can still imagine Andrew’s glinting glare and dangerous smile in his mind.

 _Yeah_ , he thinks. _I'm fine_.


	2. Anger, Apathy, and Neil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andrew’s emotional plane of existence, however small and tragic, starts and ends with Neil Josten.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back by popular demand, this is the night of Neil's assault, spoken through Andrew Minyard.
> 
> Warnings: the same warnings from the last chapter apply here, as it's the same story told through Andrew's perspective. The sexual assault scene isn't as graphic as before, but there are more graphic descriptions of violence. There are brief mentions of Andrew's traumatic past.

Andrew has two emotions: _anger_ and _apathy_. He’s not sure if the latter counts as an emotion – more like the same coffee he drinks every morning (5 sugars, 4 creams), or the sweatshirt Neil wears too often (Exy-related, fucking junkie), or simply the general state of who he is. Andrew doesn’t care.

With two emotions come two different, unpredictable reactions - unpredictable to anyone who doesn’t know Andrew, which is everyone.

Anger leads to violence – sharp knifes on unwilling skin, a rush of power more formidable than any drug in the world, pain, in his knuckles, in his jaw, on the other. It doesn’t matter.

Indifference leads to nothing – a grounding weight of boredom that tugs on loose clothing, the constant motion of walking forward, looking forward, never back. Mixing apathy with a photographic memory is ironic and, quite frankly, fucked up.

Andrew-from-the-past would have added _fear_ into this equation of emotions he doesn't understand but experiences anyway – Drake’s lingering smile, Proust’s handcuffs, a brush of calloused hands on open skin, touching, choking anticipation, Aaron’s bruised cheek, Nicky’s screaming, Neil’s abandoned cellphone. 

Andrew thought he scraped fear out of his mind years ago like old food from a rusty plate. But mold tends to grow back in places where you miss parts of the meal.

Fear usually reacts poorly with violence in which the outcome is either nothing – _please_ – or a dead body – _fuck_.

Andrew’s emotional plane of existence, however small and tragic, starts and ends with Neil Josten.

Andrew doesn’t feel regret but maybe if Bee was here, he’d admit the closest thing is the absolute fucked up shit Neil gets his confrontational ass into.

His little group of misfits were at Eden’s Twilight, minus Kevin who said he was going to bed early but likely was studying opposing teams’ Exy strategies.

Aaron had just enough mixed drinks to be tipsy but aware. Just enough to loosen the ever-constant stick up his ass and relax into the seat across from Andrew.

Nicky, on the other hand, was two shots away from obliteration. He hung off of Aaron’s shoulder, going on about Erik and cute boys at the bar and if his butt looked okay in these jeans.

In the unpredictable actions of Neil, he predictably ordered two non-alcoholic sodas. He told Andrew at Sweeties that he could drive everyone back to the house tonight but Andrew planned to have one drink either way. 

When Neil went to the bathroom, swaying slightly to the side, Andrew's skin crawled. The prickle on the back of his neck warned him that something was off. Living with a certified rapist and then a fucking martyr forced Andrew to trust his gut more than his eyes.

Just like whenever he walks into a bedroom or between the spaces of another’s skin, Andrew took inventory. Neil had already disappeared into the back where the bathroom was located. Aaron was finishing his drink. Nicky was a – 

“Fucking idiot.”

Aaron looked up, “What?” 

But Andrew ignored him, already striding to the bar. The familiar pull of anger pushed at his ankles. Andrew hated predictable things.

Nicky was speaking to a stranger, his body angled towards the taller man, his hand inching to rest lightly on his waist. Based from the curve of his cousin’s lips, he was slurring suggestive comments in the man’s ear.

If Andrew hadn’t taken note of the stranger’s tense frame from across the club, he would have left Nicky to his own devices. As it was though, a cornered bear will attack before it runs.

The squirming bodies on the dance floor acted as a barricade to Andrew’s target. Which was the only reason he was exactly 1.5 seconds behind the fist that bent back and landed on his cousin’s idiotic face.

Well-deserved? Probably. Warranted with Andrew in the same room? Never.

It took exactly two hits before the guy was down and out. At some point, Aaron had approached, likely to make sure no one attempted to haul Andrew off and make the situation worse. Or maybe he was coddling Nicky’s bruised face and ego. It didn’t matter. Because once he made it clear _not_ to touch what was his, it took him exactly 0.04 seconds to realize Neil wasn’t back from the bathroom.

“Where’s Josten,” it was both a question and a statement. 

Nicky had tears leaking down his face like a broken faucet. If Andrew could feel sadness maybe he would have sympathized. Now, it was just an irritation. A distraction.

“He didn’t look well,” Aaron said, “Maybe it was the ice cream at Sweeties.”

Nicky sniffed, “Or he, um, accidentally drank some… alcohol? Got sick?” More tears spilled unwillingly. His eye was swelling.

“He looked drunk.”

The same alarm bells that warned Andrew when someone was near his back, flashed off in his head.

_Warning. Move. Warning. Fight. Warning –_

He pushed his way back to the table, grabbed Neil’s abandoned clear glass. On the bottom rested small fragments. It could have been sugar that didn’t completely dissolve from the soda. Or even backwash from Neil’s last meal.

More likely, Andrew reasoned, Neil Josten was a _fucking dumbass._

He didn’t wait for Aaron and Nicky to catch on. Didn’t even realize they were still at the club. A swarm of anger – was it fear? No, anger, flooded into his mind unchecked. A dam bursting open. A group of fish released from a net, where’s the shark?

Andrew whipped open the door to the bathroom. There were a few straggling men, washing their hands, using the urinals.

“ _Get out_.” His teeth grit together but his tone froze lit matches. He didn’t stop to see if they listened.

Instead, all of his focus was on a single shoe, peeking out from the floor of the last stall. More specifically, Neil’s sneaker.

Andrew would like to think his emotions, however limited they were, washed over his mind in a haze of red. That the pure rage overshadowed everything he saw and heard when he stormed to the final stall. Andrew was a hurricane in the city.

But God isn’t real and Fate is a complete bitch. Because Andrew has never had the luxury of emotions strong enough to cover his own eyes, ears, movements, memory. Self-preservation is funny like that.

Neil was on his back, wedged between the toilet and the stall. There was blood in his hair, down his neck. His zipper undone. The faded scars on his wrists contrasted with the unfamiliar grip of a stranger holding them in place with one hand above Neil’s head. Blue eyes were unfocused, gazing unseeingly at the ceiling above him. If it weren’t for the small, pained gasp that escaped his lips, Andrew would think he was dead.

The stranger had fitted himself between Neil’s legs, each one stretched and curved around his body in an intimate manner. One hand disappeared between the floor and back of Neil’s jeans. The rocking motion accompanied with the man’s moan left little to be connected.

Andrew’s cursed memory absorbed the scene in 0.03 seconds. Filed it away into a dark corner next to lingering hands and gasping breaths and sharp pains. To anyone else, his entrance was a passing moment. To Andrew, it was years. 

He grabbed the back of the stranger’s neck, digging sharp nails into the man’s skin so they hooked, pulled, and released. His back hit the wall. Andrew thought the man said something, or maybe it was a cry of pain. Andrew didn’t care. He clenched the stranger’s throat in place with one grip and repeatedly curved his fist into the man’s hideous, lust-filled gaze.

He saw Drake’s crooked smile. Tilda’s hateful gawk. Proust’s balding head. The Butcher’s blue eyes. Riko’s inked cheek. The stranger’s bloody face.

Each flashing image sparked a new light of fear – no, _rage_ , always rage – and Andrew let it consume his movements as his arm vaulted back, then forward, again and again and again and again.

Soon, there was nothing but a pile of black and red and blue and brown. Andrew didn’t care.

Someone forcefully tugged at the back of Andrew’s shirt and he whirled, fist raised, to the fearful expression of his cousin. Nicky had only grazed his shirt and not his skin so Andrew didn’t pulverize the man’s remaining uninjured eye.

Instead, Andrew came back to his body. To the present. Looked down at the crumbled form of a literal piece of shit human being. Andrew breathed harshly and flexed his hands. That was the only indicator he was rattled, off his game. Nicky wouldn’t notice. Neil would. 

There was a rushing sound in his ears – no, it was the small noise Neil had made when Andrew saw him. Playing on repeat.

Fierce wrath whipped through him again, just as strong as his own resilience, and he kneeled down to grip the man’s bloodstained shirt, raising his bruised fist once more.

 _He doesn’t deserve to live,_ his mind snarled.

The rapist? Andrew?

 _Both_.

“Andrew! Ple – _stop_. He’ll die if you keep hitting him,” Nicky was begging from somewhere to Andrew’s left.

 _Good_ , a part of him whispered. The part that died when he was seven. The weak, wrecked part that was vulnerable and scared. The part that he loathed.

“Neil needs you to not end up in jail!”

Andrew stopped his movements. He hated his cousin for knowing that weakness about him. He hated that he was right.

Andrew retracted from the man, if that’s what the figure can be called now. He looked like a plum that was thrown from the 97th floor of a building and then run over by a truck. The man laid unmoving, slumped to the floor. Andrew didn’t care if he was alive. Andrew didn’t care at all.

He came back to himself. Took inventory.

_*Tap tap* Ookay folks! Rage is out of the ring! Weighing a thousand pounds, here comeeeesss… Apathy!_

There was blood on the floors, the walls, his hands, the man. The stranger’s zipper was undone. Andrew should cut off his dick.

But Nicky moved in front of him, checked the man’s pulse. So Andrew focused. His knuckles ached. His hands trembled. He’d deal with it later.

Instead, he turned around and knelt in front of Neil, placed a grounding hand on his ankle. Aaron was lodged on the other side of his still form.

Neil’s eyes were closed, his skin pale. One of his hands was still raised above his head, where the stranger had left it. The other was loosely held by his twin’s deft fingers.

The irrational part of Andrew wanted to rip Aaron away. No one should be touching Neil. Not while he was exposed and weak like Andrew once was. Not now, not ever. 

He smothered those thoughts with a stained pillowcase.

Instead, Andrew casted his burning gaze onto Aaron’s. Nicky was still fussing with the rapist behind them.

Aaron answered his twin’s unasked questions.

“I think he may have a concussion. His wrists aren’t bruised, which means he didn’t fight back, which is… uncharacteristic. That, his pupil sizing, and the disjointed way he spoke – it’s likely he’s been drugged.”

“Conscious?”

Aaron didn’t meet his eyes. Anger licked at his fingers.

“Yeah, before. Just for a while. But he couldn’t seem to focus on a single train of thought, mostly speaking nonsense. He said something about his drink. I think he knew he was drugged. Also… his… jeans are disheveled. Montgomery Medical Center is a few miles from –“

“No hospitals.” Andrew cut him off.

Neil would panic at white sheets and an unfamiliar setting. From the stranger’s covered front, to Andrew’s unforgivable memory, he knew the man didn’t go all the way, which eliminated the risk of STI’s. Also, Neil is a dumbass who never got health insurance despite having a literal magnet for violence glued to his spine. Even with his head injury, a minor concussion can't be treated by doctors. The best course of action was for him to heal at home, under Andrew’s protection.

Aaron didn’t question him.

Instead he asked, “And the guy?”

Andrew wanted to throw his twin into the wall for mentioning a rapist while touching Neil.

He gritted his teeth instead, “Dealt with.”

Actually, he didn’t know if he was dead or alive. Andrew didn’t care.

Nicky gasped behind him, “Oh god. _Neil_ –”

Rage thrashed through Andrew. He was a captive dog - no, a lion - now freed.

_Looky here, my cousin has finally decided to join the reunion!_

He whipped around faster than Neil’s footwork on the court, his hand flexed on Nicky’s neck. Not strong enough to bruise but meaningful enough to know he can.

“Oh, no, no, no, Nicky dear. You don’t get to feel pity for poor, drugged Neil. Tell me, was it you that felt up a violent stranger moments ago or was that someone else I protected?”

Andrew felt the distinct motion of Nicky swallowing. Tears gathered in the corners of his eyes before he looked fearfully behind Andrew. Neil was still lying motionless.

“Connect the dots, _hm_?” Andrew used his free hand to tap lightly on Nicky’s swollen eyelid. He flinched. 

The tears were overflowing now.

The lion crouched. Andrew went for the heart, “No, no. Don’t look at him, Nicky. Look at me. Because if my attention wasn’t on saving _you_ , I could have saved _him_.”

“Andrew. That’s enough,” Aaron always said the wrong things at the wrong times, “No one could have seen this coming.”

Oh, but Neil had. And Andrew had. Or, would have, if Nicky wasn’t so fucking good at being a distraction. An itch that can’t be reached.

Andrew's grip loosened against his will. Dropped his hand. He gazed unseeingly at the blood drying around him.

 _Not the time_ , Bee’s voice berated him. 

“Andrew, look. I’m – I’m sorry. But Neil doesn’t look good, I mean his head and – his pants are… let’s just go home, yeah? Aaron, we have medical supplies under the kitchen sink still, right?”

“Downstairs bathroom,” Aaron corrected. 

Andrew turned back to his brother, his gaze unwillingly flitting towards Neil’s prone body.

 _Not the time_ , he repeated.

It took all three of them to adjust Neil’s pliant body securely on Andrew’s back. They passed Roland by the bar, who looked questionably at Neil unconscious on another’s shoulders. Andrew, in turn, ignored him.

Said instead, “Someone took a massive shit on the floor in the bathroom. Across from the last stall.”

“Aweee man, _again_?” Roland looked absolutely defeated.

When they got to the car, managed to arrange Neil in a comfortable position, his head resting on his chest, Aaron spoke up from the back.

“Shouldn’t you have given him more of a warning?”

“He’ll figure it out,” Andrew lit a cigarette before pulling out from the club’s parking lot, driving carefully around sharp turns. His fingers itched with wanted violence.

Nicky said, “The guy’s alive and like, a drugging assaulter so he won't press charges against us. Too much attention.”

Aaron let it drop.

They drove in silence for the majority of the ride. Andrew hadn’t noticed how late it had gotten, the halo of the sun peeked from the mountains to his left. He pushed against the events of tonight crawling between the leather in the seats.

If they came to the forefront of his mind now, he’d combust on the spot. From a flashback, a filed memory, pure undiluted anger? He didn’t know. He didn’t care.

 _Save it for Bee_.

All he could focus on now was the way Neil rolled his head to the side and finally gained enough consciousness to make eye contact with Andrew.

For a man on the run most of his life, Neil should have noticed the predator. Should have covered his drink or at least fucking told Andrew he was feeling sick before wandering off. If he had, Andrew would have followed Neil to watch his back in the stall. He would have been protected, guarded, fucking safe.

 _How are you feeling?_ Is what he wanted to ask. 

“You’re a fucking dumbass,” is what he said instead.

“Me?!” Nicky cried from the back.

“Neil’s up,” Aaron responded quietly so Andrew didn't have to throw Nicky out the window.

“Huh?” Is the ever-intelligent reply of said-dumbass next to him.

“I said,” if Andrew had a gun he’d shoot himself, “You’re. A. _Fucking. Dumbass_.”

“Andrew.” A warning. A caution sign. Yellow tape on a bloody door. _Do Not Cross Do Not Cross Do Not Cross_. 

He matched Aaron's glare in the rearview mirror. Andrew was a live wire over a lake. He wanted justice, responsibility, red blood on the soles of his shoes, in between rough skin on his wrists.

 _Be sensitive for once in your life._ Aaron’s eyes said. _You, of all people, should relate._

 _He should have fucking known better. I should have known better._ He snarled back.

 _Not the time._ Aaron didn’t back down.

_Shut the fuck up, I know. Goddamn Bee-sound-alike._

“Kevin?” Neil’s slurred voice broke their silent conversation.

He shouldn’t be thinking about anyone else but his own stupid healing body, that absolute _moron_. Andrew let fury creep ahead of indifference.

Nicky caught Neil up so Andrew didn’t have to. His cousin conveniently left out the stranger’s fingers up Neil's ass, his head injury – basically the entire traumatic experience that will likely haunt Neil for the rest of his life.

It didn't matter. The drugs would wear off in the morning and Neil would watch the scene on a flatscreen every time someone touched his hips. Every time _Andrew_ touched his hips. Just add another scar to unmarked skin - this one isn’t going anywhere.

Neil didn’t respond for awhile, even after Nicky asked him a question. Andrew was a series of rubber bands that have been stretched, stretched, stretched.

He snapped. 

This was Nicky's fault and Neil's fault and Nicky's fault and Andrew's fault and _Nicky's_ and Nicky's. Nicky heard it before at Eden’s but Andrew thought he _must_ have forgotten. Why else would he flippantly talk to Neil instead of withering away with guilt and shame in the backseat? _Quietly,_ mind you.

A crack has been wedged in Andrew’s mind and someone needs to own up. Cause and effect. Pull the lever, the floor opens. There are alligators below.

Maybe there was a God because after Andrew's outburst, Nicky finally shut his mouth and Aaron stared quietly out the window, and sometimes at Andrew, and sometimes at Neil. Andrew assumed Neil fell back asleep as silence made a home on the dashboard. But a few moments passed and he felt eyes on his profile. He looked over.

The junkie was awake and wanted to ask him something, clearly. A question battled tiredness on his face before Neil focused blearily on something behind Andrew. Andrew didn't like being overlooked.

Then Neil dropped his head back on the console between them.

He slurred, “The sky would be prettier if it was purple all the time.”

Yeah. He was going to fucking _kill_ him. And Nicky. And himself. Neil shouldn’t look like that, unguarded and vulnerable and wistful and sad. Even with dried blood in his hair and unfocused eyes, he was fucking beautiful and Andrew hated him.

He met Aaron’s eyes in the mirror again.

_He’s drugged, don’t listen to him._

_Shut_ up _. I know._

Nicky looked absolutely wrecked. Andrew didn't care.

He clenched his jaw instead and glanced at Neil’s limp form, assessing his injuries for the 64th time. If he looked away now, Andrew was sure Neil would fade into the black leather seats or jump out the window or return back into the swamp of past-Andrew's drugged mind. _Fucking hallucination with body mass._

Neil raised his head, awake once more, looking positively sorrowful when he unevenly gazed back at Andrew. The drugs left Neil’s face open and readable. Andrew added this moment to all the things he hated.

As if sensing his unquenchable rage, Neil reached a shaky hand out to softly grip the front of Andrew’s chest. It lasted 1.2 seconds before falling limp in front of him, knuckles lightly brushing Andrew’s shirt instead.

“Hey,” Neil said. His voice was scratchy. Andrew made a mental note to force water down his throat when they get back. 

“I’m… I’m fi- okay. My head feels foggy and my back... I think my tongue is… is bigger than it normally is but… the sky is… look at…” Neil trailed off.

So Aaron wasn’t lying about the nonsense that lagged from Neil’s mouth. Andrew wondered if Proust giggles from the grave every time the blonde is in pain. Andrew wondered if he’d feel anything if he crashed the car right now.

“I can still yes or no and it’s still yes with you. Not him, or anyone else, but you.” 

Oh, yes. This was why Andrew hated him. Hated him for thinking something stupid like that right after he was almost raped. Hated him for knowing that’s exactly what Andrew wanted to hear – in his own fucked up way, Neil saying he’s okay, he’s fine. Hated him for looking at Andrew with such a soft, open expression.

“Andrew?” Neil sounded sad, unsure.

Andrew looked back and took a deep, shuddering intake. (Hated him for making him feel more than apathy and anger).

“One hundred and one, Josten.” Andrew knew this is what Neil needed, which is why he said it.

“Go to sleep.”

The dumbass actually relaxed at that, slumped forward in his seat, but kept his hand stretched over the console. Andrew didn’t care.

“Okay. I’m sorry. But - did you understand any of that?” Nicky’s voice piped up in a hushed whisper from the back, “They have their own _language_.”

He sounded absolutely giddy. Andrew wasn’t sure why he let his cousin live this long.

“Allison is going to _completely_ lose it!”

Aaron snorted. Another rubber band snapped.

“One more word.” He threatened through his teeth.

Nicky managed to compose some semblance of self-preservation by clamping his mouth shut and sliding down, somewhat out of Andrew’s range of sight and hatred.

If Neil wasn’t sleeping peacefully next to him, he’d crash the car on Nicky’s side out of spite. For now, he avoided potholes and drove slowly like that fucking Twenty-One Pilots song Kevin pretends he hates but listens to in the shower.

Andrew was a soft, soft man who had his hands full with an idiot, a dumbass, and an absolute nipple. They were going to get him killed.

Unpredictably, Andrew didn't care.


	3. Connections

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That annoying survival instinct stabs hard fingernails into his scarred shoulder with every pulse of Neil's still-beating heart: you’re alive, you’re alive, you’re alive. That’s all that matters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And the story continues... 
> 
> The rest of the night and morning after told from Neil's perspective. No warnings in this chapter besides brief mentions of pain, injury, and remnants of non-consensual drugging.

Neil wakes to the sound of stillness. It’s more of a feeling: the ground tilting forward and forward until it slowly drifts off the side of the continent and rolls into the sun to collapse, halting everything that was and ever will be.

More realistically, he slowly comes to the realization, the car had stopped.

Stillness is a strange occurrence, one that Runaway-Neil has never had the pleasure of indulging. Drugged-Neil now has no choice.

Neil rationalizes that he is awake, and despite the spinning gnats beneath his eyelids and hammers drilling nails into his temple, Neil can’t move.

It’s like the wire attaching his brain to his body has been brutally snipped, snipped, snapped, leaving a _401 Page Cannot Be Found_ when there should be four bars and a strong connection.

 _Loading… Loading… Loading_...

He’s one step deeper in quicksand and the branch is out of arms reach.

So when Neil hears the door beside him open, he can do nothing but fall weightlessly into the arms of Andrew. Like the ground to the sun. And Neil knows it’s Andrew because he smells like Neil and Andrew smells like Neil because they use the same laundry detergent. His head lolls back. _Loading… Loading… Loading_...

Neil’s awareness flutters in and out the window like a confused yellow finch.

There’s a slight change in temperature, a brightness behind his eyes. It’s only when he’s gently placed on a soft, lumpy surface that the page is found. He’s on a couch.

Fingers pry his right eye open.

“I don’t think he’s awake,” A familiar voice. The person it’s attached to tizzies out of reach. It’s the branch – no, the quicksand.

“Well, thank fuck you’re not a real doctor so I wouldn’t have to pay money for stupid shit I could use my own goddamn eyes to see,” Andrew. Always Andrew.

Neil feels matching glares trading the space above him. They singe the edge of his hair.

Then there’s a crash from somewhere to Neil’s left, followed by a yelp.

“Guys!” this person is loud, “I did some research and WebMD gave a list of some date rape drug symptoms. Like uhh… drowsiness, blacking-out, dizziness, memory loss, drunken… behavior? Uh, confusion, nausea, seizures… shit. Let’s see, um –“

“Did you get the supplies?” Familiar voice cuts him off.

“Yeah, yeah sorry! Here.”

_Loading… Loaded. Page found._

Neil was drugged. That's the missing connection, the broken wire. Flashes from the evening poke at his thudding veins. He remembers. Now, forgets. The connection is lost.

Neil feels a wet towel mop at his hair and neck. A sharp stab of pain from the side of his head forces him to flinch back. The towel removes itself instantly. Neil doesn't notice.

Pain gains clarity in his mind. He was at Eden’s, then the sticky floor, then the car, then the sky, then the couch.

That annoying survival instinct stabs hard fingernails into his scarred shoulder with every pulse of his still-beating heart: _you’re alive, you’re alive, you’re alive_. That’s all that matters.

 _And now?_ The voice urges, _Safe?_

Neil slowly peels his eyes open. Seven heads are floating above him, spinning. They’ve been thrown in a blender and set to “Smoothie”. 

Neil barely gets the word, “Sick” out of his mouth before phantom hands push him to the side and a trashcan is shoved under his nose. Neil’s body is betraying itself. There is nothing left in his stomach but he dry heaves anyway. Spiraling ballerinas build a hut on his forehead.

“HA! Nausea – I said that.”

“Nicky, I’m going to _fucking_ – “

Neil flops back onto the couch and closes his eyes.

“Wait, don’t let him fall asleep. Neil, can you hear me?”

“He’s not fucking deaf –“

“Yeah,” Neil mumbles. He’s agreeing to all voices. _You’re alive, you’re alive, you’re –_

“Open your eyes, you have to stay awake.”

Neil listens to the floating heads. Each eyelid weighs 20 tons and are tied from his eyelashes to his toes. He cracks them open like scrambled eggs.

“Do you know where you are?” Andrew – no Aaron – wait it’s Andrew, says that.

“… And-drew?”

_Déjà vu._

“Over here, dumbass.” Andrew is standing next to Andrew-look-alike, no that’s Aaron.

 _Aaron_ , A-a-r-o-n, Aaron.

“Aaron.” Neil says. His eyes scrunch together.

“What… where is…” Neil trails off. He had a question, something important pulling at his ear. It slips out before he can remember how to string sentences together like weaving through lies. He doesn’t remember how to end a line of words.

A hand softly pats his cheek and Neil dangles his head to look above the back of the couch. Another floating head. He knows this one too.

“Nicky…” Neil’s slurring now. He’s speaking through fabric – or is it tape, another’s hand? It sounds muffled in his ears along the numbness in his lips. Neil feels his mouth lift in an unwanted smile either way. It’s not his father’s though, and that’s good enough.

“I didn’t know… you could … you could float like…”

Something shifts to the other side of Neil and he furrows his eyebrows before looking back at Aaron and Aaron. No, there’s an Andrew in there somewhere. Andrew and Andrew. They’re staring at each other. One with a blank expression, the other with concern. Blank means Andrew. Concern means Matt. No, Matt’s not here.

“Matt?” Neil mumbles out.

Both Aarons look back to Neil. Their heads bob up and down, then to the side, and back again. Like an apple that can’t decide if it wants to dunk under a lake or stay afloat. Neil wants to stay afloat. There are eels below.

“You’re in Colombia, at home. Matt is back at the Towers with Kevin and everyone else. Do you… remember what happened tonight?”

_Sticky floors and poisoned soda and sharp pains and purple skies and moving floors and Andrew’s detergent._

His smile falls like a rock thrown from the side of an uneven cliff. If no one's around, does it make a noise? 

“Yeah,” he mutters.

A look is passed between all seven – no three – floating heads. The one above the couch is leaking. Where did the other four go?

“Get out.”

“Andrew –“

“ _Now_.”

“Jesus, okay, _okay_ , just… try to keep him awake for a bit.”

Andrew is unyielding. Stillness - but the good kind. Two floating heads dunk under the lake. Andrew stays afloat.

The warm towel makes its reappearance, along with a cool substance and white bandages. Neil unwillingly flinches again at each prod and poke, letting out a small hissing noise. He meets Andrew’s uncaring eyes. 

Andrew is a boulder in the midst of a raging storm. He’s an oak standing on nothing but roots and principles and grit. Andrew is an ever-constant feeling of quiet. He’s rough palms and hard knuckles and sharp knives – but the kind where the handle always faces the holder.

“I think I love you,” Neil doesn’t know why words fit so awkwardly between the gap in his mouth but now that they’ve left, it feels right. Like stillness. Like Andrew.

The bandage halts. Andrew looks like a shipwreck.

“Stop saying stupid things.”

Neil chews at his lip. He didn’t know he was being stupid. Stupid to Andrew means not-true and not-true means lying but Neil doesn’t lie anymore. That was a different name with a different story. The rabbit is dead.

“I’m… not … it’s not not-true,” The rabbit is dead.

“Shut up. _Fuck_.”

He doesn’t know why Andrew is angry but he knows he has something to do with it. Andrew is a crumbled paper airplane about to take off. Neil wants… wants… what? _Wants him to stay._

“Wait – _wait._ I’m sorry… I’m…”

_What do you want?_

“Andrew. Can we go to bed?”

“You’re apologizing for the wrong thing.” Andrew is all hard lines. An arrow facing North. Neil is the star. 

“Okay,” Neil doesn’t know what he’s agreeing to but guilt worms up his spine anyway, “I’m sorry.”

“ _Fucking hell_. Get up. You’re getting changed,”

“Okay,” Neil is a parrot with one line, a broken record, a GPS with a single destination. Andrew doesn’t move.

He’s staring at Neil’s outstretched body and Neil is staring at Andrew stare at him.

“Can I…?” His eyes are fierce. Andrew doesn’t move.

Neil tries to place thoughts with observations but the connection keeps short-circuiting. Stutters, connects, flatlines. He says yes anyway.

Andrew moves then, lifts Neil’s arm to drape it over his shoulder. They stand together like a pair of distorted conjoined twins. The world tilts. Who is holding who?

He’s placed gently on the bed in Andrew’s room. Despite the ballerinas, Neil remains sitting up. He wants to stay afloat. Aaron said he needed to stay afloat and Andrew said he needed to change. But Andrew has replaced one room for another, standing over Neil, stillness stealing breaths between them once more. Uncertainty looks a lot like fear.

“Can you move?” Andrew asks.

Neil tries lifting his leg, glares at the limb. It raises a few shaky inches before the puppet strings break. He shakes his head.

Andrew is burning. 

“Do you want help changing?”

Neil vaguely notices that Andrew said “want” and not “need”. This is important but Neil doesn’t know why. He glances once more at his disobeying leg before slumping his head back to meet Andrew’s eyes. He thinks he’s understanding more as time passes. He’s a lingering cloud that’s learning how to rise again. He nods his head.

“Words.”

This is important but Neil doesn’t know why.

“Yes.”

There’s a slight tremble in Andrew’s hands when he takes off Neil’s clothes. Anyone but Neil wouldn’t have noticed. A small part of him whispers Andrew needs a cigarette. The more ~~truthfu~~ l annoying part says it’s because of him.

Andrew takes off Neil’s shirt without preamble but he’s gentler as he unbuttons Neil’s jeans and carefully slides them down. Neil shifts around the discarded pants and winces slightly as a small pain spikes up his back. Andrew, being too close and too watchful, stops. Looks up.

“I said, yes,” Neil whispers, reassures.

“You didn’t before.” Andrew replies.

To anyone else, the comment would have been cruel, offhanded, apathetic. But Neil, coming off of purple skies and sticky floors, knows it’s time to tie his ankles back down to Earth. Andrew needs him to. Gravity is a bitch. This is just how they are. 

“I’m saying it now.”

“You shouldn’t.”

Andrew removes the rest of his pants before slipping an oversized t-shirt over Neil’s head, leaving him in his boxers on the bed. He doesn’t take hazel off of blue.

Neil gently rests on the pillow behind him, laying on his back but angling his head to watch Andrew’s movements as he moves around the barely-lit room.

Neil’s mouth still feels numb, his tongue too big for his gums. But the confusion that clogged the air between his ears have settled, leaving a dull thud of pain behind instead. Unspoken words claw at the bedroom door with urgency. Neil is a coward.

“You… you’re not like him,” he gets out.

Andrew stops in his movements, turns to face Neil fully.

“I’m – I’m never going to… I’ve just…” _This is important._ “I’ve survived everything and I’m still here. And you’re… still here. I’m not. I’m never going to be afraid of you.”

Silence. A smile stretches along Andrew’s face but it’s wrong, grotesque. It’s from another time, another face. 

“Oh,” he coos, “But won’t you?”

Suddenly, Andrew is in front of him. On the bed. Placing his body firmly above Neil. Arms on either side. The smile doesn’t waver.

“What if I touch you…” A hand slides to cup his backside, “Here?”

Another hand grips his wrist. 

“Or here?”

Neil waits to feel panic boil over like water left on a stove for too long. He lays motionless. _Loading… Loading… Page Found._

“That’s fine,” he whispers. It’s a revelation, a light bulb, the end of a sentence. _Houston, we do not have a problem_.

“It’s fine,” he says again in wonderment.

Andrew is watching him with a strange expression. Dangling above like a black widow or a forgotten thought or a shield.

And Neil, just because he can, just because he knows he can, says, 

“Stop.”

Andrew is off and three feet away, still watching, always watching. It's cold where he left.

A cheeky smile, not the drugs and not his father’s, pull at Neil’s lips. He hums.

“That’s why.” he’s teasing, he’s remembering, he’s fine.

Andrew narrows his eyes.

“You’re a fucking dumbass.”

* * *

The next morning Neil wakes to Andrew’s messy blonde hair tickling his nose. But it was the pain nudging at his useless form that urged Neil to gain consciousness. Before he can shift, Andrew is awake and staring. Neil knows he can’t hide the grimace on his face.

“Where.”

“Just my back a bit and my head." His voice has been thrown in a woodchopper.

Neil coughs slightly, winces, before rubbing at his temple and groaning, "I feel like I have a hangover.”

He relaxes his face and peeks a glance at Andrew, "Do you think it's the concussion or the drugs?"

"Don't give the team another fucking bet," he replies sharply, but his eyes are light. 

Andrew leans back towards the nightstand and gives Neil two Advil’s and some water. He must have put them there last night. Neil hums his gratitude. He lies back down, a hand plays with the ends of Neil’s curls.

Some parts are missing but Neil remembers most of the previous night. He wonders if he should text Nicky and Aaron. He wonders if they told the rest of the team what happened. Andrew would probably knife down his own family to protect Neil's vulnerabilities, even if Neil didn’t consider last night a secret.

He's been through Hell and back and Hell and back again. Neil tries not to think about what horrors Andrew relived when he found Neil. Maybe one day he'll tell him.

Neil still isn't sure himself what happened between the bathroom and the car. He's not sure he wants to know.

All that matters now is that Neil is alive, Andrew is alive, and they're both fine... or as "fine" as either of them gets these days.

Neil distinctly remembers Nicky gushing about their own language - something the rest of the team will _definitely_ know about and likely point out or bet on in the future. But that's fine too. They're fucked up in so many fucked up ways but they understand each other.

Next to being alive, that's the only other thing that matters. 

He's brought to the present when Andrew tugs on his hair. 

“For a goddamn runaway, did you forget how to watch your back? All those years on the road fucking wasted, Josten.”

Which means, _I was worried. You’re an idiot. Be more careful._

Neil hums again. He turns to rest his cheek on Andrew’s shoulder, eyelids growing heavier with each passing breath.

“I have you for that now,” he mumbles back. _I’m sorry. I will. I still trust you._

“I fucking hate you.” _I fucking love you._

Neil smiles into the other’s shoulder blade, eyes slipping close one last time.

“Yeah, yeah, one hundred and twenty - got it.” _I l_ _ove you too._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello hello! I'm back with the final chapter ahh! Oof, that ending was GUSHY. Honestly, I could have left it at the last chapter but I was reading over all of your lovely comments again and was inspired to add a little more to this story (our boys deserve some tooth-rotting fluff after what I put them through). I hope it was everything you guys ~hoped and dreamed~ it would be xx
> 
> On a more serious note, sexual assault is a very sensitive topic to write about and I hope I portrayed it well and respectfully.
> 
> As always, thank you so much for reading and please let me know what you think! Also if you enjoyed this piece, check out my other work for this fandom, "Lighter Fluid" x


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